Nov 08, 2013 – Jan 11, 2014

Pace presents the first exhibition of Indian-born, London-based artist Raqib Shaw. Known for his opulent paintings and sculptures, Shaw creates shimmering, jewel-like surfaces, which often use dark images drawn from ancient myths from both Eastern and Western tradition. Featuring new paintings and sculptures, the show will span all three of Pace’s galleries on 25th Street.

Raqib Shaw

Paradise Lost

Nov 08, 2013 – Jan 11, 2014

New York

508 West 25th Street

510 West 25th Street

534 West 25th Street

New York NY 10001

Tel: 212.989.4258

Fax: 212.989.4263

Tues – Sat: 10 AM – 6 PM

Pace presents the first exhibition of Indian-born, London-based artist Raqib Shaw. Known for his opulent paintings and sculptures, Shaw creates shimmering, jewel-like surfaces, which often use dark images drawn from ancient myths from both Eastern and Western tradition. Featuring new paintings and sculptures, the show will span all three of Pace’s galleries on 25th Street.

About Raqib Shaw

Raqib Shaw (b. 1974, Calcutta) is a Kashmiri artist who lives and works in London. He is known for his opulent and intricately detailed paintings of phantasmagorical dreamscapes made with surfaces inlaid with vibrantly colored jewels and enamel. His works reveal an eclectic combination of Western and Eastern influences, from Persian carpets and Northern Renaissance painting to industrial materials and Japanese lacquer. Shaw has had solo exhibitions at Tate Modern (2006) and The Metropolitan Museum of Art (2008). Shaw was the subject of an exhibition at the Manchester Art Gallery, which traveled to Galerie Rudolfinum, Prague.

Press Release

Monumental Exhibition to Span All Three of Pace’s 25th Street Galleries in Chelsea

508, 510, 534 West 25th Street, New York

November 8, 2013 – January 11, 2014

Opening reception: Thursday, November 7, 6 - 8 PM

New York—Pace Gallery is honored to present Paradise Lost, a three-venue exhibition of London-based Kashmiri artist Raqib Shaw. This is his first public presentation in New York since the 2008 exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Opulent scenes of beastly anthropomorphic figures amidst fantastical worlds of idyllic skies and classical ruins fills Shaw’s first exhibition at three venues at Pace.

Included in the exhibition are ten paintings, three sculptures, and five drawings. Based on the theme of John Milton’s Paradise Lost, they are a fusion of Indian mythological figures, hybrids of man and beast, warring in landscapes inspired by quattrocento and Renaissance painting. They are a synthesis of Indian miniatures painted with precision and delicacy and Western classical architecture inspired by Carlo Crivelli’s The Annunciation in the National Gallery, London. Shaw’s series can be interpreted as a direct confrontation between East and West where the shattered monuments suggest the triumph of the East.

Paradise Lost will be on view from November 8, 2013 through January 11, 2014. An opening reception with the artist will be held on Thursday, November 7 from 6 to 8 PM. A catalogue will accompany the exhibition and include an essay by art historian Sir Norman Rosenthal.

Born in Calcutta and educated in London, Shaw’s oeuvre is unique amongst his contemporaries. As Rosenthal writes in the catalogue, Shaw creates, “truly modern transformations of lost worlds of culture,” that arise from, “the exotic gardens of Kashmir to the memories that lie ‘imprisoned’ in the great museums of the Western World.”

At 508 West 25th Street three painted bronzes will be exhibited. Inspired by Renaissance bronzes, the figure studies evoke wrestling subjects such as Laocoön and Michelangelo’s Dying Slave. The central sculpture, Moon Howlers . . ., is inspired by the artist’s collection of bonsai trees. This eight-foot sculpture depicts a series of human forms, with different animal heads, clinging to the branches of a giant bonsai and looking at the moon. In striking contrast to the ferocity of the figures, hundreds of delicate cherry blossoms explode from the branches and scatter at the base.

At 510 West 25th Street, Shaw’s most monumental work to date, Paradise Lost, begun in 2001 and finished just in time for the exhibition, consists of twelve panels measuring 10’ x 60’.

At 534 West 25th Street, paintings and drawings will be shown. Amongst them is St. Sebastian of the Poppies, in which the martyr is tethered to a Corinthian column as simian-faced cherubs attack. Scarlet poppies fill the foreground of this tondo-shaped work. In Arrival of the Ram King - Paradise Lost II zebra centaurs cavort within architectural ruins beneath a sunset of dazzling intensity.

Shaw’s approach is meticulous. He begins by outlining the composition with gold stained glass paint in a technique similar to ancient Asian cloisonné. Then, using porcupine quills for their precise point and flexible nature, he applies colorful enamel. Oil paints are employed for modeling the images. The surface is then embellished with glitter, crystals, and semi-precious stones.

Sir Norman Rosenthal describes Shaw’s aesthetic as, “a vision of his own made special through a brilliantly seductive technique, equally of his own invention, allowing him and us both a distant separation, yet also an involvement. Equally, the viewer is seduced with the intensity of color heightened by the inlay of precious and semi-precious stones—emeralds, rubies, sapphires, diamonds—which all contrive to push the boundaries of excess and allow for those moments of humorous, even deliberate vulgarity. Each painting and sculpture tells a story as we move about its surface and into its space.”

Raqib Shaw (b. 1974) is a Kashmiri artist who lives and works in London. Known for his opulent aesthetic featuring colorful scenes inlaid with enamel, glitter, and semi-precious stones, Shaw’s phantasmagorical dreamscapes often depict characters in conflict and commonly draw from the artist’s own “diaries” alongside the violent and erotic. Leaving India in 1998, Raqib Shaw earned his BA and MA at Central St. Martins School of Art in London and has been exhibited at prestigious venues internationally.

Significant group exhibitions include: the Museum of Modern Art, New York (2006); ICA London (2006); Deste Foundation, Centre for Contemporary Art, Athens (2006); National Gallery, London (2006); Wattis Institute for Contemporary Arts, San Francisco (2011); and Asian Art Museum, San Francisco (2012).

News

Wall Street Journal's Mary M. Lane interviews London-based artist Raqib Shaw on his trip to New York for the opening of his first exhibtion with Pace Gallery. Paradise Lost remains on view at Pace's 508, 510, and 534 West 25th Street locations.
Click here to read more, and here to view the full slideshow.

November 8, 2013 - January 11, 2014
Pace presents the first exhibition of Indian-born, London-based artist Raqib Shaw. Known for his opulent paintings and sculptures, Shaw creates shimmering, jewel-like surfaces, which often use dark images drawn from ancient myths from both Eastern and Western tradition. Featuring new paintings and sculptures, the show will span all three of Pace’s galleries on 25th Street.

W Magazine goes inside the studio of London-based artist Raqib Shaw. W writer Alex Needham sits amidst the artist's own Shangri-La to discuss Shaw's preparations for the upcoming three-venue exhibtion to open at Pace in New York this Thursday. For the full feature, click here.